Minimal molecular response in polycythemia vera patients treated with imatinib or interferon alpha. Academic Article uri icon

Overview

abstract

  • Imatinib and recombinant interferon alpha (rIFNalpha) can induce remission in polycythemia vera (PV) patients, but gauging the depth of responses has not been possible due to lack of a specific disease marker. We found that patients undergoing imatinib (n = 14) or rIFNalpha (n = 7) therapy remained strongly positive for V617F JAK2, although there was a significant reduction in the median percentage of mutant alleles that correlated with hematologic response (P = .001). Furthermore, individuals who achieved complete hematologic remission had lower levels of V617F than those who did not (P = .001). Of 9 imatinib-treated cases for whom pretreatment samples were available, 7 with no or partial hematologic responses showed a marginal increase (median, 1.2-fold; range, 1.0-1.5) in the percentage of V617F alleles on treatment, whereas the 2 patients who achieved complete hematologic remission showed a 2- to 3-fold reduction. Our data indicate that, although PV patients may benefit from imatinib or rIFNalpha, molecular responses are relatively modest.

authors

  • Jones, Amy V
  • Silver, Richard T
  • Waghorn, Katherine
  • Curtis, Claire
  • Kreil, Sebastian
  • Zoi, Katerina
  • Hochhaus, Andreas
  • Oscier, David
  • Metzgeroth, Georgia
  • Lengfelder, Eva
  • Reiter, Andreas
  • Chase, Andrew J
  • Cross, Nicholas C P

publication date

  • December 13, 2005

Research

keywords

  • Antineoplastic Agents
  • Interferon Type I
  • Piperazines
  • Polycythemia Vera
  • Protein Kinase Inhibitors
  • Pyrimidines

Identity

Scopus Document Identifier

  • 33645740979

Digital Object Identifier (DOI)

  • 10.1182/blood-2005-09-3917

PubMed ID

  • 16352805

Additional Document Info

volume

  • 107

issue

  • 8